‘Prometheus 2’: Still Happening, Now With More Michael Fassbenders

No really, are you reading this? According to The Wrap, the “Untitled Ridley Scott Project” slated for 2016 that has been such a mystery for so long now is Prometheus 2. After 20th Century Fox announced a whole slate of movies through 2018, with a blip in the schedule for 2016 for Scott’s mysterious film of the unknown, speculations were ablaze at what the director could be cooking up as his next move. Another Blade Runner movie to follow up the reboot he’s currently working on? That would’ve been cool, wouldn’t it? A completely new film unconnected to a franchise without any expectations? Real rad.

Instead, we’re getting the sequel to the unofficial prequel to the Alien franchise. It’s not as if this news wasn’t coming sooner or later; In 2012, Prometheus was a box office hit, raking in $400m worldwide. But what it wasn’t was a critical darling. The film was a bit of an all-around mess – let’s not kid ourselves. Spoilers ahead.

The film starred Noomi Rapace as Elizabeth Shaw, the leader of a group of scientists tasked with finding a group of other lifeforms called the Engineers, an alien race that served as the creators of humankind. Shaw and her crew, which includes Charlize Theron, Idris Elba, and an android Michael Fassbender, set off on the spaceship Prometheus to seek out this unknown entity and find the answers to our biggest question: where did we come from?

Throughout the film – since this is an Alien prequel, after all – calamity ensues mostly because of human-based stupidity regarding dangerous aliens and a MAPS EXPERT WHO GETS LOST. Fassbender’s pesky android, David, does a little bit of meddling on his own and is rewarded with a puzzling but mesmerizing scene at an alien command center where he presses lots of buttons and sees pretty holograms. Viewers at home have to provide their own “beep boop beeps,” sadly.

The frustrating film ended with Rapace’s Shaw (the lone survivor, because she was the only one with a brain) escaping the godforsaken planet with David’s remains in an Engineer spacecraft. With no way to get back to Earth, Shaw intends to find the Engineers’ homeworld and figure out why they wanted to destroy the humans; meanwhile, an alien bursts forth from an Engineer’s chest. Do you smell a sequel?

Though details about Prometheus 2 (the working title) have not yet been revealed, it’s pretty clear what’s going to be happening, don’t you think? After working with Damon Lindelof on the first film, Scott has brought on his Blade Runner scribe and Green Lantern writer Michael Green to tackle the sequel. Green has said that the film will be much more “alien-y,” in reference to the 1979 classic, with the tone much more horrific and tense as it was in the past films.

Prometheus 2: now with more chest-bursting.

Additionally, the film may contain multiple David androids on screen, aka multiple Fassbenders on screen at the same time. If anything, the sequel is better already. Scott is expected to start working on the film this fall, after delivering his Bible epic Exodus.